The use of information processing systems in managing medical care has become increasingly important to both the patient and the physician. Computer software systems have been developed that enable for-profit health care enterprises to deny a patient access to medical care. U.S. Pat. No. 5,471,382 to Joseph P. Tallman et alia discloses a medical network management system based upon a patient assessment program that is stored on a computer system. The patient is asked questions generated by the program which have "yes" or "no" answers. First the patient's eligibility is checked. If eligible, then a series of questions is asked, the answers to which cause a particular branched chain algorithm to be selected. Once all the questions from the branched chain algorithm are answered, the number and type of questions being dependent upon particular answers to particular questions, a pre-selected analysis of the medical care to be offered the patient, if any, is generated, including the timing, type, and level of medical care.
Databases can store enormous amounts of patient information, and thus, expand the capabilities of physicians in making decisions. One way databases have been used to aid physicians in making a diagnosis is to transform data based on prior results of other patients. U.S. Pat. No. 5,594,637 to Alan J. Eisenberg et alia discloses transforming a physiological test result by using at least one non-test variable. The transformed test data is compared to the mean and standard deviation of a database of similarly transformed data. The likelihood of a given outcome for the patient is given. Simultaneously, the database is updated with the result from the new patient.
Relational databases have added physicians getting access to medical information. A use for relational databases in managing medical care is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,626,144 to Christopher A. Tacklind et alia. A system for monitoring and reporting medical measurements includes a stand-alone monitor that can store data records such as measured values and time stamps. The monitor transmits the records to a remote reporting unit over a communication system. When the reports are received by the remote reporting unit, they are entered into a relational database. Chronological graphs are generated for that patient of the measured values and transmitted to the health care provider.
Relational databases have been used to perform automatically prioritized nursing diagnoses based upon incoming patient assessment data. U.S. Pat. No. 5,404,292 to Maria F. Hendrickson discloses a data processing system that stores relations between patient characteristics and nursing diagnoses are stored in a relational database as primary and secondary diagnoses tables. The database also stores a priority table that links a particular diagnosis from the diagnoses tables with a corresponding measure of priority. A potential diagnosis list is generated from the patient assessment data. Each diagnosis is weighted from the accompanying priority measures in the priority table. Probability measures are added together from all diagnoses stemming from the total patient assessment data for a patient if more than one relation is provided for a diagnosis.